National Affairs: Conference

A week's listening, a week's thinking, a week's speaking and the
Conference on the Cause and Cure of War, held by nine women's
organizations in Washington (TIME, Jan. 26), was over. Although there was much
talk, the chief effort of the conference was to find
expression-effective means of expressing in action a will to peace.
First, by lecture and debate, the causes of war were considered. Next,
the cures were considered. Finally came resolutions.

The more important events:

¶ Judge Florence Allen of the Ohio
Supreme Court declared that mankind's conviction that war is necessary
must be changed, that the maxim "the state can do no wrong" must be
changed to "the state shall do no wrong."

¶ William S. Culbertson, of the U. S. Tariff Commission, proposed an
international conference on the distribution of raw materials and
the conservation of national resources. Prof. Warren Thompson of
Miami University (Ohio) asserted that over-population is the chief
cause for war, and that the only cure for it is birth control.

¶ Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, Chairman of the Conference, suggested
that a new Cabinet post, "Secretary of Peace," be created. She declared
that the Army and Navy must "continue to be honored and respected until
a safe and sane substitute is found." Race and religious prejudices
must be abandoned, she asserted, and concluded : "The white race must
disgorge. The lands we stole from the yellow and black races at the
point of the sword must be returned ere there can ever be peace on the
earth."

¶ Prof. Manley O. Hudson of Harvard placed hope in the
League of Nations.

¶ George W. Wickersham, one time Attorney General, faced the
Conference, affirmed that some wars are righteous and that therefore all
wars should not be outlawed—wars of defence, wars in which a country
goes to the aid of a weaker nation oppressed by a strong one.

¶Mrs. John D. Rockefeller Jr. left the conference before its conclusion but
sent a letter to Mrs. Catt which was read:

"Here is a question to which, as a mother, I crave the answer:

"How can one best build up in the hearts and minds of children a
resistance to war that will carry them through war epidemics in the future?
Do we not need to instill in them not only a horror of war as futile
and cruel but a sense of justice and tolerance toward races and nations
not their own, which will deepen their love of humanity to the point
where they will be willing to make sacrifices for the common good? In
this method I feel we must persist, even after we have joined the World
Court and the league and codified the laws. Isn't it our only way of
making them permanent? . . .

(Signed) "ABBY A. ROCKEFELLER/'
¶ In a closing speech, Mrs. Carrie
Chapman Catt urged peace among the peacemakers. Let no one plan be
singled out by each group but rather let them join in a common cause.